Book Excerpt: Lorenzo’s first afternoon in the abbey

When he gets bored of holding his arm against the heater, he turns to unpack his bag. His few clothes he puts away neatly in the wardrobe and his two books on the table—his Carlo Carretto and his personal copy of the Rule of Saint Benedict—look as though they have always belonged in that room.

At that hour of the afternoon, the winter light is on the wane. From the barred window, he sees some five metres away, across a stretch of nondescript lawn, a series of wooden crates amongst several rows of oleanders, dandelions and other flowering plants. He recognises the boxes. They are Dadant wooden frame hives. Their neighbour in Aquilinia, Elvio, has them at the rear of his house. They have been buying honey from him ever since the sixties. The bees would be hibernating, though. Wise of nature as usual; whenever possible, just doze right through the lousy weather. Beyond the hives and the shrubs, he can see the leafless, grey listless vineyards and in the distance, the dull bulk of the Boscalbo hill.

The afternoon is the time for private meditation, reflection and study. All over the world, the Benedictines have divided the rest of the day into ora et labora, or seven communal prayers and a fair deal of manual work. For his private contemplation, Lorenzo has no need to open the books that he has brought with him. He knows them by heart. ‘Idleness is inimical to the soul,’ murmurs he to the high ceiling as he stretches out on the bed, ‘and therefore the brethren ought to be occupied at fixed seasons, with manual work…for then are they truly monks, when they live by the work of their own hands, as did our fathers and the apostles…and again at fixed seasons with spiritual reading.’ Well, he tells himself, actually he should shut up when he lies down, for the Rule even lets him know how to repose and how to read. And when they rise from table after the sixth hour, let them rest upon their beds in complete silence, or if by chance anyone should wish to read, let him read as that he may not disturb anyone else.

He sits up. It doesn’t seem right, to nod off on his very first afternoon in the abbey. He looks down at his hands. He should have trimmed his nails before leaving home. His fingers appear nicotine-stained even though he hasn’t smoked in five months and sixteen days. Giving up had not been difficult, had been almost fun, just a matter of getting down to it. He didn’t see any resident of the abbey smoking. It would be that kind of place that left it to its inmates to decide whether to smoke or not and no one would. Even if he were to be offered a Diana. He grins at the memory. Those smokes from across the border had been quite wonderful. Part of the delight had been the clandestine manner of their procurement. For years they’d done it, the entire family, practically three times a month, driven the ten kilometres from Aquilinia to Ankaran or Škofije in Yugoslavia (an economy drive, his father would call it), shown their laissez-passers (a privilege they enjoyed by virtue of being Triestini) at the frontier, topped up the fuel tank—because, like everything else, petrol was much cheaper in Tito country—and returned with kilos and kilos of prime cuts of veal and loin of pork and cartons of Diana cigarettes stuffed under the car seats. Even when he had switched to Marlboros, he had on occasion taken a Diana from his father (not too often, though, for Amedeo needed two packets a day for himself) just to enjoy its acridity tinged with the agreeable memory of its covert acquirement.

At four sharp, a tap on the door. He is out in the corridor in seconds. He is still in the clothes—jeans, white shirt, pullover, duffel coat—that he put on at home in Aquilinia that morning. Father Biagio and he climb the stairs, and by means of the north corridor of the cloister Pensile, enter the sala del capitolo that, through an anteroom, gives on to the rear of the apse of the church.

In the corridor, Lorenzo sees for the first time the monks and novices of the abbey. They are all dressed in black and he feels conspicuously out of uniform. Everyone is headed in the same direction but he spots no groups or pairs, each one walks alone. They nod to one another and half-smile at the newcomer. As per the statute, their heads ought to be bent in meekness and contemplation. It is Benedict’s twelfth step in humility. Lord, I, the sinner, am not worthy to lift up mine eyes to heaven. But fourteen hundred years of interpreting the Rule has imbued to it a suppleness, an elasticity that allows its adherents to bend, twist and crane their necks with ease, and to smile and nod without feeling guilty or sinful or deserving of a chastising thunderbolt from Heaven.

— Excerpted with permission of Speaking Tiger